CHENNAI: The Cabinet chaired under Chief Minister M K Stalin gave approval to 5 foreign companies to start business in Tamil Nadu. Five companies, including Caterpillar and Petronas from Malaysia, have granted approval.
Discussions also include Karunanidhi’s centenary celebrations in Tamil Nadu and arrangements for the President’s visit.
Raipur. In every major city of Chhattisgarh including the capital, sex service business is going on openly in many places in the name of spa and massage parlours. In the posh area, this business is continuously spreading in the name of massage parlour. Prostitution is taking place in the massage parlors and cafes of the city including many hotels of the mega highway. Girls are doing flesh trade in the guise of massage in parlours. On the other hand, in hotels, young men and women are staying in rooms without revealing their identity. Girls from other states are doing prostitution here by staying in massage parlors and hotels.
Girls from other states stay in many hotels of the city, who make relations with the youth coming to the hotel. While according to the rules, the room cannot be booked in the hotel without the identity documents. Not only Indian, foreign girls will also be found working in the massage parlour. Alam is that if you search massage parlor by entering the name of the area on Google, then not one or two but dozens of massage parlor names will appear along with the mobile number.
In every small and big city of the country, the business of prostitution has now reached posh areas and luxurious markets after coming out of the infamous streets. To throw dust in the eyes of the police, the brokers of this business have hi-teched their method. Till a few years ago, the businessmen used to take the guise of orchestras and musical groups, or modeling agencies, providing escort service in five-star hotels or sending girls from brothels in posh areas for prostitution. But when all these methods were caught in the eyes of the police, the businessmen made spa and body massage a cover for their business. About five years ago in India, spa and body massage parlors were either in five star hotels or in very posh markets of metros. Later the companies running the resorts adopted this business to attract tourists. Till that time the business of spa and body massage was considered very neat and respectable. Not everyone could even enjoy this luxury as spa packages used to be very expensive. Getting a spa and body massage was considered a status symbol. Young men and women from educated and upper-class families used to adopt jobs in spa and body massage clinics and parlors as a career. Many big domestic and foreign cosmetics companies were associated with this business. But about two years ago, the business of spa parlors and body massages got black eyed by the merchants of prostitution. When the cover of other businesses closed, the callgirl operators started opening spas and body massages. In the last two years, spas and body massage parlors have mushroomed in every small and big city of the country. Malls, posh markets, lavish and well-equipped spas and body massage centers opened in every city where rich people live and tourists move. To attract customers, these spa centers installed attractive shine boards, got their website made and their attractive advertisements started appearing in newspapers and magazines. In the last year and a half, this business has become completely successful.
CUTTACK: In a bid to generate more funds for meeting the expenditure towards solid waste management, the Cuttack Municipal Corporation (CMC) has decided to hike the user fees of different categorised business establishments.In the first phase, the civic body in its Licence and Appeal Standing Committee meeting on Friday has increased the monthly user fees of kalyan mandaps from Rs 4,000 to Rs 7,500.
At present, of the 64 kalyan mandaps enlisted with the civic body as many as 26 have complied with the new policy and guidelines approved by Orissa High Court. The status of others particularly with regard to parking area, dumping of waste, installation of CCTV, fire safety certificate, security etc., are being assessed by CMC.
It was also decided to regularise CMC’s market complexes after some shops were found to have been occupied in unauthorised way and some are even reportedly sub-leased to third parties. The CMC owns around 506 shops in 10 to 12 market complexes.
As per the decision in the meeting, the civic body will start repairing and renovating some market complexes which are in a dilapidated state. CMC has decided to hike user fees of other business establishments which include the nursing homes, clinic and diagnostic facilities.
“We are going to revise Schedule 1 of CMC’s Solid Waste Management bylaw to hike the user fee of other business establishments and the revision process is under consideration,” said CMC deputy commissioner Amiya Kumar Panda.
By PTI
ISLAMABAD: India never halted trade relations with Pakistan and wants to move towards normalising business ties, a senior Indian diplomat here has said, stressing that today’s diplomacy focuses on tourism, trade and technology because “money speaks its own language”.
Suresh Kumar, India’s Deputy High Commissioner to Pakistan made these remarks on Friday while speaking at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), the Dawn newspaper reported.
“India always wants better relations with Pakistan because we cannot change our geography,” he said. “We didn’t stop trade with Pakistan, it was Pakistan that did it. It would be better to see how we can change our problems and situations,” Kumar added.
In 2019, after New Delhi revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, Pakistan suspended bilateral trade with India and expelled its High Commissioner in Islamabad. India has been maintaining that it desires neighbourly relations with Pakistan while insisting that the onus is on Islamabad to create an environment that is free of terror and hostility for such an engagement.
The trade with Pakistan stood at USD 329.26 million in 2020-21 and USD 830. 58 million in 2019-20, the data showed.
He agreed that the number of visas issued by the Indian embassy to Pakistanis dropped during the Covid-19 pandemic. However, he insisted that the number has now increased, as 30,000 visas were being issued every year, which he said was “a huge number”.
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Kumar said the Indian government was also issuing medical and sports visas to Pakistanis. He said gone were the days when diplomacy used to focus on compiling political reports. Today’s diplomacy, he said, revolved around tourism, trade and technology “as money speaks its own language”.
India was presently doing trade of USD 120 billion with China, in which the balance of trade is towards China, he said, stressing that imports “are not always wrong and also have advantages”.
Kumar said that intellectual property has become more important than physical property. “By sitting in distant countries and manufacturing in other countries, Europe is making money due to intellectual property rights. Universities in Europe focus on technology” he said.
He said transit trade was extremely important as Central Asia was a big market and India needed access to it. Similarly, Central Asia also needed access to India.
He said India was on course to become one of the largest economies. “Our service sector has grown enormously and now we are focusing on manufacturing, like automobile and electronics manufacturing,” he said.
LCCI President Kashif Anwar said it was generally thought that improving economic relations between India and Pakistan was a complex issue that required addressing a range of political, economic and social factors.
“But we are of the view that the foremost step that could be taken to improve economic relations between India and Pakistan is to normalise trade relations. This would bring substantial economic benefits evenly to both the countries,” he said.